


(you send me) flying

by friendlybknws



Series: (meta)human after all [1]
Category: ITZY (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, F/F, Gen, Hwang Yeji is a Flying Brick
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-25
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-15 20:20:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 16,587
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29689404
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/friendlybknws/pseuds/friendlybknws
Summary: Yeji's life is normal. Except for the parts where she flies, lifts an eight-ton bus with ease, and must deal with living with her old middle school crush.
Relationships: Choi Jisu | Lia/Hwang Yeji, Hwang Hyunjin & Hwang Yeji, Hwang Yeji & Shin Ryujin, Lee Chaeryeong/Shin Ryujin (Past Relationship)
Series: (meta)human after all [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2181798
Comments: 7
Kudos: 16





	1. take off

> Tachycardia-induced levitation of a 1-year-old girl: a case report  
> Jaebeom Im, M.D., Jinyoung Park, M.D., & Jiaer Wang, M.D.  
> Department of Pediatrics, College of Medicine, Jinyoung University, Seoul, South Korea  
> Published January 16, 2002
> 
> Summary
> 
> Science fiction has become reality with the emergence of metahumans ( _Homo sapiens var. superiorum_ ) throughout the world. Although South Korea’s metahuman population growth (0.4%) lags behind other Asian countries, conventional medical intervention has been given to those who view their and their children’s newfound abilities as a handicap. We report the case of a 1-year old girl presenting with tachycardia-induced levitation (TIL) who was diagnosed with congenital supraventricular tachycardia (SVT) at birth….

_Beep. Beep._

_HR: 100 bpm_

Twelve-year-old Hwang Yeji has never thought of herself as anything out of the ordinary.

She has a father who lets her play video games on the weekends, a dog that she occasionally bathes, and a mother who packs her lunches and walks her to school on the weekdays. Their walk did not have anything out of the ordinary, save for the dysfunctional traffic light at a nearby intersection. Before they part ways in front of the school gates, her mother would casually remind her of the box of mints inside her bag. Yeji doesn’t recall a day when her mother forgot. 

The sound of mints moving about has always been accompanied by the distant beeping of her pulse watch, slow and calm. When the beeping became incredibly annoying, she’d grab her mint box and pop one into her mouth, letting its bitter taste coat her tongue. In her early years, Yeji had always wondered why her friends’ mints tasted sweet. Now, she’s old enough to realize that the mints aren’t what they say they are, and that her mother intentionally empties out newly bought boxes of mints into a jar in the kitchen whenever she thinks Yeji's fast asleep.

In short, Yeji knows that she has a “condition”. She just doesn’t think much of it.

Nothing has happened in a long time anyway, despite her parents’ constant worry of her not telling them if her pulse went over 119 beats per minute. The last time it had happened was when she was eight. She vaguely remembers the rumbling in her chest, like a thousand engines revving inside her ribcage. It sounded way scarier in her father’s story, where he saw her fall from the top of the stairs, almost breaking her skull open if not only for her mother’s waiting arms. To be honest, Yeji wouldn’t even remember it if they didn’t remind her. Her memories must’ve grown wings and flew away without her knowing.

No matter what anybody may say, to Yeji, _this_ is normal. The quick drumming of her heart is her body’s way of responding to things ever since she could remember. It’s no different than Kim Hyunjin needing to eat bread every time her stomach rumbles out loud in the middle of class, or of Ryujin needing to pet a stray cat every time she sees one. No difference between that and her _actual_ disease that she needs _actual_ medicine for. She’s normal. Just the right amount of normal.

Right?

_Beep. Beep._

_HR: 80 bpm_

Right. It’s been two years, and fourteen-year-old Hwang Yeji is still the right amount of normal.

“You’ve got nothing to worry about.” Thirteen-year-old Ryujin tells Yeji on their way back home from school, its rusting school gates and the disgusting green of the buildings disappearing from view. Among her group of friends, Ryujin has always been the most reasonable. She pats Yeji’s shoulder reassuringly. “You’ve got two clubs and you’ve been getting decent grades. Not too much that you’ll qualify for a scholarship, but not too little that you’ll stay behind and be in my class next year. You’re already graduating in three days, unnie.”

“Yeah, but one of those clubs is the metahuman research club.” The older girl sighs, crossing her arms over her chest. “That _you_ roped me into.”

She fires a playfully stern look at Ryujin who laughs, medium length hair thrown back in glee. As expected of the eccentric club’s loyal vice president. “Yes,” she says proudly, grinning. “But isn’t our club cool? A lot of clubs like it are appearing across the district, unnie. I’ve seen a lot of news reports of a metahuman in Daegu lately. She’s a high schooler…”

…with the ability to run very quickly, like a rabbit. Or a cheetah, but even faster. Yeji recalls the story from the morning news. They said that she had been staying in a small orphanage and couldn’t move when she was a child. Stuck to a wheelchair, needing someone’s help to push her around. But there she was, on video, now running wild like a comic book superhero, wheelchair forgotten. These metahumans achieve things that feel miraculous, no crucifix or holy water needed. To Yeji, from a year of interesting discussions with her younger clubmates, there’s no doubt that metahumans exist. She just wonders if they look any different from any normal human, like her. Do they look as pixelated as they are on TV? What do they think of the normal majority? Have they felt the need to suppress their abilities? She might hate to admit it, but these are some of the questions that keep Yeji up at night. Maybe she should stop hanging around Ryujin too much.

“Why are you worried about being weird again?”

Ryujin asks once she finishes gushing over ‘rabbit girl’, as she so affectionately calls. The two of them reach the younger girl’s bus stop in front of the only crosswalk Yeji has to walk through before she gets to her apartment complex. The older girl presses the pedestrian call button.

“Just thinking. High schoolers aren’t known to be nice,” she replies quietly.

“Why don’t you start making friends your age, then?” Ryujin asks. “Since Kim Hyunjin is going to get exiled to a boarding school and is never going to see us again.”

The sulky remark elicits a soft chuckle from Yeji. “I’ll miss her too, Ryuddaengie.”

“But do you know who’s a friend your age? Choi Jisu.”

The remark makes Yeji turn to Ryujin a little too quickly. She then looks at where the younger girl has been looking—a familiar figure not too far away from them, in the same uniform as theirs, donning a pair of headphones. It’s been a year since she moved here, but Choi Jisu will always be the new kid to many. There was an aura to her that screamed privilege—from her dainty hands to her expensive-looking running shoes—that set her apart from the middle-class majority. She stood out while Yeji had always blended in, too far in the background to get noticed. Yeji had always preferred it that way.

“Isn’t she going to your high school, unnie?” The sound of Ryujin’s voice stops Yeji from entertaining her thoughts any further.

“Y-yeah, I heard too.” Yeji whispers, as if Choi Jisu would hear her with her headphones on from three meters away. “Don’t know if we’ll be in the same class, though.”

Ryujin turns to her with both eyebrows raised. The devilish smile on her lips is even more worrying, however. Yeji gulps.

“Why don’t you ask her and find out?”

_Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep._

As if on cue, Choi Jisu spares them a glance. Turns out, three meters is not enough distance for Yeji to _not_ make out the beautiful details of her face. Stupid good eyesight. Yeji immediately turns back to the road in front of her, like nothing happened. She wants to be invisible right now. Like one of those metahumans that stole a truckload of idol merchandise from a warehouse last December.

_Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Bee—_

“Woah, woah, slow down, unnie,” Ryujin takes Yeji’s wrist and looks at the digital readout, a smile still on her lips.

_110 bpm_

Yeji has known Ryujin ever since she got that pulse watch of hers. With countless play dates and tteokbokki dates with Hyunjin after school under their belt, they’ve shared almost everything there is to know about each other. Like how Yeji’s only ever incredibly shy when their homeroom teacher asks her to solve a math problem. Or how Yeji tends to be really shy to initiate small talk with people she barely talks to in the classroom.

“Don’t tell me you haven’t talked to her before?”

Well, not _exactly_. Yeji winces.

Ryujin gapes in disbelief at Yeji’s silence before she chortles, doubling over. “I only have choir with Jisu unnie and _I_ talk to her,” she wheezes. “You have three classes with her. _Three_!” Yeji squirms in place as her inability to be social is being exposed to the few students passing by. She covers her face with her hands to save the last of her remaining dignity. “You even got to—ahaha—to sit right beside her for half a year!” Ryujin manages to say through her tears. “Half a ye—!”

“I get it, I get it!” The older girl turns to Ryujin again and puts an arm over her shoulder, loose hug bordering on a chokehold. “It’s just I haven’t had the reason to! She’s always surrounded by her friends.”

Yeji has the guts to look at Choi Jisu this time, who is luckily looking at anywhere but her. Nice.

“She isn’t surrounded by any of them now.” Ryujin whines, looking up at the older girl with a frown. “Come on, unnie. You have to woman up and talk to her.”

“There’s still three years of high school left to talk to her, Ryuddaeng.” Yeji shrugs. She sighs in relief as she feels her heart return to its normal pace, the beeping becoming slow and steady.

_HR: 80 bpm_

The wait for Ryujin’s bus feels like forever at this point. Unsurprisingly, her eyes remain on Choi Jisu’s side profile. Ryujin wiggles out of her grasp to take a phone call (“Why is this _traitor_ calling all of a sudden? Shout if the bus comes by, unnie”, she says as she storms off to talk to Hyunjin) as Yeji remains frozen in place. In her defense, she’s had conversations with Jisu before. Simple greetings addressed to Yeji have rolled off Jisu’s tongue in those six months when they were seatmates. Granted, Yeji could only reply with a grin or a hum or something that did not even qualify as a word.

But that’s what crushes do to people. Yeji’s just unlucky to have a heart disease that prevents her from enjoying the feeling of her heart going wild. What came after that feeling scared her.

As she sees Jisu start moving towards the empty pedestrian crossing, Yeji’s mind stops. The pedestrian light might’ve turned green when Yeji wasn’t looking, but the stoplight above them is gleaming green. A bus—Ryujin’s bus, to be exact—is quickly coming towards the pedestrian crossing that had an oblivious, headphone-wearing Jisu.

_HR: 118 bpm_

Yeji had to act quickly. Ignoring the incessant beeping from her wrist, she leaps towards the crossing as swiftly as she could, finding herself feeling as light as ever. In no time, she pulls Jisu towards her side, their bodies colliding softly. A clammy hand is holding a delicate one, cold like the frigid winter air around them. When Jisu finally turns back to look at Yeji, the latter’s heart starts revving like a rusty engine being turned on for the first time. Her crush is looking at her with wide, surprised eyes, pupils fully blown in their deep brown irises. Something about seeing Jisu up close like this feels magical. Like flying.

_HR: 140 bpm_

As the bus comes to a quick stop a few meters away from them, Jisu smiles. Yeji starts hearing the incessant beeping again as she smiles back. She senses her heart beating at the same pace, and then suddenly, nothingness. Yeji feels her grip on Jisu’s hand loosen, feels herself falling backwards, her eyelids going heavy.

The last thing Hwang Yeji hears in the background is a screaming Ryujin, and Jisu’s unmistakable yet slowly disappearing voice, shouting for help.

_Beep. Beep._

_HR: 69 bpm_

Hwang Yeji is a junior at Jinyoung University at twenty-one, majoring in dance. Nothing much has happened in her life since the whole fainting-in-front-of-her-childhood-crush incident.

If she had told anyone that, she would have been lying.

Her mother saw the whole episode from their apartment balcony that Wednesday, eight stories up. That night, as per Ryujin’s account, Yeji was rushed to the hospital on a stretcher, beeping from her pulse watch going insanely fast, even surprising the medics. Jisu had called them just in time before Yeji’s mother had a nervous breakdown, cradling her unconscious child’s head in her lap before the ambulance came to take Yeji away. Both Jisu and Ryujin tagged along with Mrs. Hwang to the hospital and received an earful about the dangers of broken stoplight systems and Yeji’s condition. When Jisu left that night, or when Yeji’s father came dramatically bursting through the emergency room doors, Ryujin barely remembered.

The only thing on her mind was the large gap she saw between Yeji’s unconscious body and the pavement.

“You were floating, unnie. Like, literally floating in space,” said an extremely ecstatic Ryujin the next day, oblivious to Yeji’s embarrassment about the whole thing.

But aside from blushing at the mention of a certain girl’s name, fourteen-year-old Yeji can _float_. Like a plastic bag in the middle of a polluted ocean. How lame of a metahuman power is that?

Although that day had given her a newfound ability, it also gave her parents a reason for them to move to some upscale apartment complex an hour away from their old one. They didn’t want to wait for the stoplight to get fixed. That meant saying goodbye to tteokbokki dates with Ryujin, to walking her to her bus stop everyday while humoring her metahuman tangents, and to the idea of actually talking to Jisu once they become classmates again. They only exchanged a wave or two when their eyes met accidentally at graduation. That was the last time Yeji ever saw Choi Jisu.

Yeji realized that she worried about high school too much when she was already in it. Everyone was a little weird, and in an art school it seemed like the norm. She needed to feel normal for once, especially when Ryujin had made a big deal out of meeting an actual metahuman. She would take a train just to see Yeji on Saturdays, knocking at her bedroom door at four in the morning. Ryujin was determined to be Yeji’s Mr. Miyagi. They went on weekend training together (when Yeji didn’t have practices with her local dance crew, or when Ryujin’s parents were away on long business trips) which involved Ryujin jaywalking to recreate the incident, and many laps around the local public park. No training session led to any success, however. Throughout her first year of high school, Yeji never floated once.

When Ryujin was old enough to go to Yeji’s high school and start regular, daily training (and not because she missed Yeji terribly despite the countless video calls and their weekends together), Yeji started to doubt if she was indeed a metahuman. Nobody else saw the incident aside from Ryujin, and Yeji’s parents have never even talked about metahumans, even when they’re on the news saving lives. Sometimes, Yeji wondered if Choi Jisu was the metahuman. Maybe she cushioned Yeji’s fall as a thank you gesture for saving her from being roadkill. Maybe a metahuman passerby was nice enough to lend some help. Or maybe Ryujin’s eyes were just fooling her completely.

That year, however, both of them befriended Lee Chaeryeong, the newest girl in Yeji’s dance crew who just happened to be Ryujin’s classmate. In hindsight, Yeji thinks Chaeryeong’s complete silence on the topic of metahumans whenever it came up in daily conversation should’ve been a sign. Because during an unsupervised break on a schoolwide camping trip that same year, Chaeryeong pushed Yeji off a cliff.

_HR: 140 bpm_

It was the first time Yeji felt her heart go haywire in two years. The engine was up and running again, and _boy_ , was it _running_. Although she was screaming for help the whole time and contemplating on how many bones she’ll actually break when she hits the ground, it actually felt pretty good. She let herself be consumed by the sensation of wind in her hair and her wild heartbeat. Soon enough, just like when she held Choi Jisu for the first time, she felt like she was flying.

And then, she was. Hovering two meters above the forest below, all 206 bones intact. Sixteen-year-old Yeji wanted to cry, to laugh, and to strangle Chaeryeong all at the same time. A minute passed with her just there, listening to the annoying beeping of her pulse watch, everything falling into place. A tap on her shoulder by Chaeryeong’s hand, attached to her curiously rubbery arm extending from the cliff three _meters_ above, was all it took for her to realize that she wasn’t alone. The younger girl happened to be just like her.

(“I could have died!” Yeji cried, moments after Chaeryeong pulled her up safely. The latter only chuckled in response as Yeji hugged her, as if pushing someone off a cliff was a weekly occurrence. That day, Ryujin discovered an ability of her own—the ability to shut up for an entire day.)

From then on, with Chaeryeong and Ryujin’s help, Yeji discovered four things:

(1) she’s a metahuman who can fly, especially when her resting heart rate exceeds 110 bpm

(2) her parents and pediatrician knew (1) all this time and never bothered to tell her,

(3) her talent of carrying ten grocery bags in one trip isn’t just fueled by the idea of her mother nagging about her taking too long, and finally,

(4) jump scares will make her fly through the roof, literally.

Unfortunately, none of those things can help her in her current predicament.

“Did you know that staring at your phone will not make Chaeryeong call or reply any faster?”

Yeji looks up from her phone screen with a scowl. With her in the small kitchen of her two-bedroom apartment is Ryujin, sitting on her kitchen island comfortably as she stuffed her face with sweet potato pie. The older girl knows that it’s hard to look menacing in her unflattering get up at seven am—a worn out, oversized hoodie she stole from her dad and a pair of cute, banana print shorts—but she knows Ryujin is aware of how dire the situation is and why she had every right to be frustrated.

Two weeks ago, her roommate suddenly decided to move out without telling her, having dropped out from university entirely to start some industrial metal band. Yeji is all about artistic pursuits (she even majored in dance!) and has been supportive of said roommate, even when her egg carton soundproofed bedroom failed her on nights when she’d belt out unintelligible lyrics until sunrise. Here’s the problem: her ex-roommate has been unable to pay her share of the rent for the last two months. She immediately cut ties off with Yeji after escaping, blocking her on every social media site possible. Despite Yeji’s best efforts in trying to locate her, it appears that she has disappeared from the face of the earth.

Yeji has thought of a few ways to make her suffer once she locates her (putting her in the middle of a busy intersection while she slept, throwing her off a cliff—Chaeryeong’s idea, putting her in the same universe as ‘A Quiet Place’ if it was possible, to name a few). But she had far more important stuff to take care of. Although she managed to pay for rent by herself for two months, Yeji can’t possibly do that for one more month. The guilt of taking more money from her parents may consume her entirely. She really needed a roommate.

“Thanks for being a smartass, Ryuddaeng.” Yeji huffs, putting her phone in her hoodie’s pocket before gingerly opening the fridge.

“Aww. That’s probably the sweetest thing you’ve said to me all month, Yeddeong,” she hears Ryujin say as she stares at her food options for the rest of the week. There’s nothing in the freezer, and only four items below: two boxes of takeout from two days ago, an empty plastic bag of her favorite gummy worms, a nearly empty container of her mom’s sweet potato pie, and her hydro flask.

Yeji will be on a new diet called starvation tomorrow if her new roommate doesn’t show up.

“You have to chill, unnie. Chaeryeong says she’s got everything sorted out,” Ryujin hops off the island and closes the fridge for her. She clearly knows Yeji long enough to know when she’s brooding. “Her friend will move in today, she’ll pay for rent immediately, and then you won’t be broke anymore. That’s all there is to it.”

“But what if she arrives while I’m away? I still need to give her keys before I get dressed.” Yeji pulls the drawstrings of her hoodie with a frown. “I had to replace doorknobs after mangling two of them yesterday.”

Both girls look at the trash bin beside the fridge. Two extremely deformed knobs sit on top of paper scraps, imprinted with Yeji’s fingers. The sight makes Ryujin gasp.

“Wow. Remind me to not make any ‘choke me daddy’ jokes around you ever again.”

“Please don’t.” Yeji deadpans.

“You have been going to the metahuman support group thing I recommended you go to, right?” The younger girl turns to the latter expectantly.

“Yeah, every Tuesday. I’ve made progress.”

Being able to fold a hundred origami cranes the size of a thumb is progress, right? It’s a feat that is hard enough to do when Yeji still thought that she was a normal human, but as a metahuman adult with superhuman strength, it’s something to be proud of. The metahuman support group isn’t disguised as some obscure origami club, however (actually, they’re called JYU Meta Alliance, a name fitting for some sketchy MLM scheme). Folding origami cranes for ants is only one of many scheduled activities for the members. Yeji’s just lucky to be a strength user to get that one in particular. It’s far from the flashy training montages in the superhero movies she grew up watching, but Yeji is still thankful for the organization’s help in trying to control her strength.

(And to some extent, trying to locate her ex-roommate through telepathy. The telepath, Hwang Hyunjin—who’s not blood-related to her by any means, Yeji _swears_ —hasn’t texted her back yet. Why is nobody texting her back?)

She has made strides in her flying after the first two times. Her doctors told her that she has grown out of her flying-fainting spells and can now exercise and dance without worrying about running on air, unless she stops thinking about staying grounded. Yeji can now fly off the ground to a height of a five-story building at will, without needing to hear her old pulse watch beep like a metal detector on steroids. Going higher has been a challenge, however, as she hasn’t had the time to practice doing so. Flying in the middle of a crowded city isn’t exactly socially acceptable. Metahumans, although many, still needed to keep themselves hidden.

The only thing that hasn’t changed from the day she was pushed off a cliff was Ryujin and Chaeryeong being there to look out for her. And occasionally clown her. Really the best of both worlds.

“Unnie,” Ryujin calls, dusting off crumbs of pie crust on her leather jacket. “Do you know why Chaeryeong has only mentioned Julia once in all the years we’ve known her?”

Yeji rubs the sleep from her eyes with a frown.

“Who’s Julia again?”

“Your new roommate. Ryeong’s childhood friend.”

Yeji remembers the name Julia vaguely from nights of heart to heart talks with her best friends over pizza and movies. She shrugs in all honesty. “I don’t know. Maybe she didn’t feel the need to? There are people in our childhood we never told her about, you know.”

“That’s right,” Ryujin nods. “Like Kim Hyunjin or Choi Jisu.”

It suddenly makes Yeji feel nostalgic. Those two names are from long ago, always associated with the icky green walls of her middle school and the equally icky taste of her childhood mint digoxin. With their scary pranks or dazzling smiles that sent young Yeji thinking twice about liking boys, both of them had made her childhood what it was. She knew Kim Hyunjin and her present whereabouts (moved to Hong Kong in the middle of high school, returned as a football player for a nearby university in college) but Choi Jisu will probably stay an unreachable enigma for the rest of Yeji’s life. Yeji can’t help but wonder what she’d look like as an adult now. Would she still be as pretty? Still as soft spoken? Did she grow up gay like Yeji did because of her?

What if Jisu was in her university? Would she recognize her? What if she suddenly showed up at—

Ryujin’s phone rings from the pocket of her jeans, followed by the prompt buzz of Yeji’s doorbell. The two girls look at each other with surprised eyes.

“Go get the door.” Yeji says, immediately taming her bed head into a loose bun. “I’ll hide the broken knobs.”

Ryujin chuckles as she salutes, dashing to the threshold of the apartment. Yeji grabs the bin with the offending agents in record time, floating to her bedroom to put them there. When she hears the door open with Chaeryeong’s unmistakable voice, Yeji walks over to the cream-colored couch in the middle of her living room. It’s too late to assess the state of her apartment now, but she gets the feeling that she just has to. She’s too busy looking for pie crumbs on her coffee table to notice Ryujin’s very, very awkward laughter.

“Yeji unnie!” Chaeryeong greets brightly as she comes into the living room, hugging Yeji immediately. “Sorry I wasn’t able to reply to your texts. I had bad reception at the airport.”

The older girl reciprocates the hug just as much, but not before she sees Ryujin looking at her like she’s actually screaming inside.

“What’s up?” Yeji mouths.

Ryujin points to the girl looking at Yeji’s old childhood photos near the shoe rack. Before she could even mouth a response back, the stranger in the room turns around to face Yeji and Chaeryeong. Her small face is framed by her medium length, dark locks, complimented by pouty lips and a button nose. Her eyes look eerily familiar—that particular shade of brown, that shape. Yeji must have seen something similar before. On a singer on some television show, or in her foggy memories of nights out with friends. Somewhere from a distant past.

It then hits Yeji like a bullet train when the girl smiles.

_HR: 90 bpm_

Fuck.

Did she just summon Choi Jisu with her weird delusions earlier? How many powers does a normal metahuman even get? Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Why can’t she get another power like, uh, infinite source of food or money? Why is the world playing tricks on her? Okay, Yeji tells herself, just breathe. She’s coming closer right now and will sense Yeji’s panic. Why would Yeji even think that she still remembers her? She just has to smile. And breathe again. Smile while breathing. That’s right. She must ignore her pulse watch and its crazy beeping. Right. Now.

_HR: 100 bpm_

Yeji doesn’t notice how loud the beeps actually are, too far in her own thoughts. Unsurprisingly, a confused Chaeryeong does, and decides to break the sudden tension in the room with a laugh. She quickly moves towards and links arms with Juli—scratch that, an adult Choi Jisu wearing an expensive-looking jacket over a tight-fitting crop top & high-waisted jeans. Adult Choi Jisu looks (and dresses) better than Yeji could have ever expected.

“This is Jisu unnie, a friend of mine who just came straight from Canada. She went by Julia there.” Chaeryeong says casually, the girl beside her bowing to Yeji in acknowledgement. “She’ll be studying in JYU too from now on.”

“Oh. Y-yes, hello.” Yeji bows back stiffly, trying to keep her smile in place. Behind the two girls in front of her, Ryujin is soundlessly laughing despite her struggle to bring Choi Jisu’s bags inside.

“You really have a nice place here, Yeji.” Jisu’s voice is a little deeper than what Yeji remembers. She then feels incredibly seen as Jisu gives her a once over, curious eyes taking her all in. “It’s nice to see you again after so long. You’re still good friends with Ryujin, too!”

Jisu turns to a smiling Ryujin, who is obviously amused by the whole situation. A clueless Chaeryeong raises both eyebrows at Yeji. Yeji frowns as she shows her the heart rate reading on the still beeping watch.

_110 bpm_

_Oh._ Chaeryeong mouths. She detaches herself from Jisu and quickly anchors Yeji down to the ground as hard as she could. Her absence from Jisu’s side seems to go unnoticed as the girl continues to talk to Ryujin. The two of them carry all of Jisu’s bags to the only empty bedroom. When the door behind them closes, Chaeryeong immediately turns to Yeji with a glare.

“You and Ryujin better tell me what’s up before I ask Jisu unnie myself.” she says, before letting Yeji go and disappearing to the newly occupied bedroom (Choi Jisu’s bedroom, of all people!) to help her unpack.

As soon as Yeji is left alone in the living room, she sighs shakily. Her heart starts to calm down again as she breathes in through her nose, chest rising and falling slowly. She’s the one desperate for a roommate, she tells herself. She should be thankful for having Jisu around. Yeji shouldn’t care about her suddenly showing up at her door, like the recurring theme of her dreams back when she was fifteen and really hung up on not being able to attend high school with her. Yeji groans.

“Nice shorts. They’re cute.”

Jisu’s voice makes Yeji turn to her in a flash. Her ex-crush-turned-new-roommate’s grin is infectious. Yeji attempts to mirror it calmly as she lets out the shakiest “thanks” she has ever said in her entire life.

When Yeji enters her room moments after, she immediately floats three feet off the ground, softly screaming into a pillow.


	2. climb

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw: mentions of blood & head trauma.
> 
> also, skz's hyunjin appears heavily in this chapter.

_Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep._

_HR: 85 bpm_

“You haven’t spoken to her since she got settled in?”

Yeji grimaces at how loud Chaeryeong’s voice is at their usual booth in Hussey Pizza, a popular restaurant just outside of Jinyoung University. It’s Friday night, and the whole place is packed, the sound of busy chatting accompanied by pop music from the speakers. Despite this, Chaeryeong’s second outburst of the night (the first was “Yeji unnie had a crush on Jisu unnie?” after Ryujin finally updated her on everything) still gained attention from some students who were just trying to enjoy their evening. Yeji hides her face with a menu in embarrassment. She’s thankful that Jisu is in the girls’ washroom right now, oblivious to the chaotic conversation.

“Give her a break, Ryeong,” Ryujin speaks up, nudging her friend with her elbow. “She didn’t talk to Jisu unnie for six months despite being seatmates in middle school. Jisu unnie’s been only here for two weeks. I’m sure they’ll be conversing regularly in a year’s time, right?” The snicker she lets out doesn’t go unnoticed. Yeji narrows her eyes at her.

“I just haven’t caught her outside her room yet!” The latter whispers defensively. “I’m always out first thing in the morning before she’s up and I come back home before she does.”

(A half lie, Yeji notes. She remembers Jisu sitting in her pajamas in the living room munching on a donut last Saturday, Animal Farm on TV. Her roommate greeted her with a raspy good morning before Yeji left to jog around the campus. In her defense, she did grin before wordlessly bolting out of there. That counts as a conversation, right?)

“You’re being a terrible roommate, unnie.” Chaeryeong frowns.

“Excuse me.”

A voice interrupts before the menu is taken away from Yeji’s hands, rendering her defenseless from judgmental stares. The three girls in the booth look up to see Shin Yuna, red, Hussey-branded apron over her high school uniform. She smiles at the three apologetically. “Dad says he’ll have to kick you guys out if Chaeryeong unnie ever shouts like that again.”

“She won’t. Thanks, Yuna.” Ryujin says through stifled laughter, patting Chaeryeong’s shoulder as the latter mimes zipping her mouth shut.

Yeji wants to laugh at the younger girl’s dilemma, but when she sees Jisu walking back to them from far away, she freezes. Her cheeks start feeling way too warm. She tries to think that it’s because of the amount of people in the room, but it’s really just from the shame of not being able to utter a word to her roommate. How did she even manage to avoid her for two whole weeks? Yeji wanted to ease herself into talking to Jisu, not pressuring herself to do anything. That’s what she did to her past roommates, anyway. Conversation should come naturally.

There was also this added element of Jisu being the first crush she ever had that happened to grow up looking like long-lost royalty. So, she waited until she felt ready to talk to her. And waited. And waited again.

It’s not the best idea Yeji’s ever had. Her capacity to overthink about the simplest things amazes her sometimes.

“Everybody okay here?” Jisu asks once she reaches the booth.

Yeji nods when their eyes meet for a split second, but she is not okay. She’s not okay with how her best friends seem to be scheming right now, Ryujin whispering in her same-aged friend’s ear as Chaeryeong busied herself with something on her lap. Yeji soon finds out what that something is when she feels a hand brush against her knee. She peeks briefly at her lap to see Chaeryeong’s hand, accompanied by her outstretched, spaghetti-like arm, showing the older girl a typed-out message on her phone.

 _Please talk to her for me_ , it says, complete with a teary-eyed emoji. Did Yeji have the heart to say no to that?

“Since we’re all starved, Chaeryeong and I are going to go to the counter to place our orders. Do you guys want anything in particular?” Ryujin commands attention as she stands up, pulling Chaeryeong along.

(Meanwhile, Yuna, their designated waitress for the night—who is supposed to take their order, stays quiet and hides the notepad she’s been holding behind her back. Great.)

Yeji doesn’t like where this is going. From the look of things, her so-called friends (Yuna included) are going to leave her after Jisu finishes talking to them. _This_ was probably the plan all along. There is no escape for Yeji as she’s trapped at the end of the booth, the four girls standing there blocking her only exit. Maybe it’s really time that she spoke to Jisu. She had to do it now.

As Ryujin, Chaeryeong, and Yuna disappear from view, Yeji opens her mouth to speak.

“Hi.” She starts, making Jisu look at her. “You should sit down.”

Jisu seems surprised at the sound of her voice. She still obliges anyway, sitting beside Yeji as she offers her a small, amused smile. “It’s nice to see you out of your room for once,” she jokes.

Yeji settles for a genuine grin. “Yeah, I guess it is.”

“This is probably the first time we’ve talked by ourselves ever since I complimented you on your banana shorts.” Jisu nods to herself.

Right. The banana shorts. It’s a shame that it will be forever remembered as a part of her first real conversation with Jisu, Yeji thinks. “Oh, is it really?”

Jisu laughs softly in response. “I’m pretty sure. Do I make you _that_ uncomfortable?”

Yikes. Yeji totally gets where the question’s coming from.

“Well…,” she trails off as she starts drumming her fingers on the table in front of her, trying to rack her brain for a real reason. She hasn’t had much time to think about how _present_ Choi Jisu made her feel.

“Looks like a yes to me.” Jisu squints.

“Uncomfortable isn’t really the right word to describe it!” Yeji reasons, leaning on the backrest. “It just—it feels weird that I get to meet you again after so long.”

“Same here.” Her roommate smiles in the same way Yeji remembers from all those years back, unbelievably warm. “Didn’t expect Chaeryeong’s Hwang Yeji is the same kid who saved my life before my middle school graduation. I haven’t had the chance to thank you for that, by the way.”

(For the first time in her life, Yeji doesn’t feel embarrassed of the incident.)

“You’re welcome.”

“Still got your heart monitor thing, huh?”

Jisu is looking at her left wrist on the table, adorned with her old pulse watch, beeping quietly. Yeji is surprised at how calm it has been ever since this conversation started, but she’s even more surprised at how her roommate could possibly remember. She didn’t think Jisu would pay attention to things like that. Things about her.

“Well, yeah,” she answers. “It’s more of an exercise thing now.”

“Cool. I’m not much into exercising myself.”

“But you look good. You really do.”

The compliment leaves Yeji’s lips before she has time to think about it. How subtle of her, really.

“Oh. Thank you.” Jisu’s laugh is shy and makes Yeji’s smile grow.

“Say,” the latter leans in a little closer, feeling a surge of confidence run through her, “just in case you get into it, I don’t mind taking you running with me.”

“And make me miss my Saturday morning reruns over donuts?” Jisu raises an eyebrow.

Yeji nods wordlessly this time, like the countless times she had answered to Jisu before. She watches as the girl purses her lips in thought, soon reaching out to pat Yeji’s knee, looking straight into her eyes. Yeji gulps nervously.

“I’ll consider it,” Jisu finally says, all in mock seriousness. At that, Yeji beams in relief, soon chuckling under her breath.

In the middle of their surprisingly calm discussion, they barely notice when Ryujin and Chaeryeong return with food, Yuna on their tail. The conversation in the booth turns loud yet comfortable, as if they’ve done it all together many times before. Jisu falls into place easily in their little group with her honest remarks and occasional jabs, mostly at Chaeryeong.

To Yeji, their group finally feels complete.

Maybe having Choi Jisu around won’t be so bad.

_Beep. Beep._

_HR: 67 bpm_

Yeji learns way more stuff about Jisu after that.

Firstly, she always seems to only have her coffee cold, sitting in her baby blue mug at the kitchen island whenever they have their breakfast together. Which is, surprisingly, quite often: every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. It feels weird the first couple of times, since Yeji did spend most if not all of her time in the past avoiding Jisu like the plague. Without Yeji realizing it, it soon became routine. She only noticed after Jisu had texted her one afternoon, apologizing profusely for missing one of their “together breakfast” mornings, as she would call it.

It’s refreshing to have someone like Jisu as a roommate: someone who actually wanted to be good friends with Yeji, and not just live under the same roof as her and be tolerated by her. 

“Why dance?” Jisu asks her one Friday morning, lagging behind Yeji in a near empty street leading up to the campus. The transition to having together breakfast to having together trips to the campus is easy, like the way Jisu hums and sings whenever she thinks she’s alone. Their stomachs are filled with the leftovers Yeji heated up after a night of grueling practice, too tired to do anything else, but still intent on fulfilling her unspoken promise of spending breakfasts with her roommate.

“Why not?” Yeji muses.

Jisu laughs, taking a few strides forward to land a soft punch on Yeji’s arm. “C’mon, just answer the question. I’m genuinely curious.”

“I liked it. I remember fighting my parents to let me dance even with my heart condition growing up.” Yeji nods to herself, glancing at the girl who’s now beside her. “Eventually I grew out of it. My doctors told me that I was fine, so my parents gave me the green light. I can’t imagine myself doing anything else since then.”

“Really?”

Yeji hums in agreement.

“Guess you’re one of the lucky ones, then.”

“I am?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Jisu nudges Yeji with her shoulder. “You’re set on what you want to do in life. That’s a rarity.”

“Haven’t you thought about what you want to do?” Yeji’s eyebrows furrow, head tilting as she looks at the younger girl beside her.

“I’m afraid I didn’t get the chance to think much about that.” The latter replies honestly. “With my parents breathing down my neck and all.”

“Did they…”

“Force me to take my business program?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Sort of. They definitely had a hand in it.” Jisu looks up to the slightly taller girl, eyes twinkling as she grins cheekily. “Managed to sneak a fashion design minor under their noses, though.”

Her expression makes Yeji chuckle, her head finding it too cute and her heart finding it too hard to keep it down. But her eyes just can’t stop staring at Jisu’s side profile as she stops talking, thoughtfully looking at the approaching campus gates before them.

“I mean, I love them,” Jisu continues after a moment, “but it’s hard to think about things like that without some time alone. Without some independence. Moving to Canada before high school made me closer to my mom and my stepdad, but it also made me realize how much they influenced my decisions. I thought I needed to do something for myself. So, when the opportunity came, I grabbed it.”

It’s a bold move, to do what Jisu is doing. Yeji doesn’t think she’ll have the guts to do that if she were in the same position as her. “And that’s how you ended up here,” she says, following her roommate’s line of thought.

“Yeah.” Jisu nods. “They’ll be moving back too in a few years, but I wanted a head start. Wanted to start feeling at home here again.”

“Do you think we’re doing a good job?” Yeji’s voice seems to get drowned by the sound of chatter as they enter the campus grounds. Jisu looks up at her again.

“At what?”

“Making you feel at home.” Yeji shrugs, unsure of why she even asked the question in the first place.

A small grin tugs at Jisu’s lips, hand fishing out her phone from the pocket of her jeans. The screen comes to life as she presses the home button, showing it to Yeji with a proud smile. “What do you think?”

The lock screen on her phone is a recently taken polaroid picture on the familiar cream couch in their shared apartment. In it is a grinning Yuna, way too happy to be allowed to sleep over on a weekday as she uses her arm as a selfie stick, a coolly posing Ryujin right beside her, Chaeryeong with her head on the latter’s shoulder, peace signs on both hands, Jisu herself smiling beside her childhood friend, and a genuinely beaming Yeji, just happy to be in the moment.

Yeji finds herself mirroring that smile of hers. “Cute.”

“Yeah,” Jisu says, smiling eyes on Yeji the whole time, “I think so too.”

“You got anything planned for tonight?” Yeji asks, peeling her eyes away from the phone screen to look at Jisu. “I’ll be picking Ryujin up from class later to watch this new band her friend is in. Chaeryeong and Yuna might be free to hang out.”

“Actually, I do.” Jisu’s grin disappears, looking away to her building coming up nearby. “My classmates invited me out for a mixer. I’ll be home a little late.”

“It’s fine.” Yeji nods understandingly, soon sucking in a breath. “That’s… actually really good for you. Meeting new people.” She isn’t disappointed at the least. Not at all. She shrugs. “I don’t even know if the band plays well.”

“Jisu! Over here!”

A tall, lanky looking guy shouts from the stairs leading up to Jisu’s building, handsome looks apparent even from miles away. The sight makes the two girls stop walking. Jisu immediately waves at him, shouting back a “wait for me!” for good measure.

“Was it a group of classmates or just _one_ classmate?” Yeji teases, nudging the girl beside her with an elbow. Jisu turns to her to slap her playfully on the arm, rolling her eyes.

“Well,” Yeji fiddles with the strap of her backpack, “I guess I’ll go head off to my building now—”

Her words are cut off by Jisu snaking her arms around her waist, hugging her tightly. She isn’t the one with superhuman strength, but Yeji suddenly finds it difficult to breathe. Jisu is tiptoeing a bit to rest her head on Yeji’s shoulder, softly whispering a “thank you”.

Yeji finds herself chuckling in surprise. “Why?” she asks, patting her friend’s back awkwardly.

The hug lasts for only a few seconds before Jisu pulls away, looking at Yeji dead in the eyes as she smiles.

“For feeling like home.”

Oh. Yeji nods dumbly, something bubbling in her stomach. “You’re welcome.”

Before she even realizes it, Jisu runs to her friend standing by the stairs. She spares a glance at Yeji once she reaches him, a smile on her lips as she waves the older girl goodbye. As Jisu slowly disappears into the building with the guy in tow, Yeji starts feeling the wind beneath her feet, and hears the familiar beeping from her wrist.

_HR: 111 bpm_

“Damn it.” Yeji closes her eyes, willing herself to stop floating.

_Beep. Beep._

_HR: 69 bpm_

“What are you smiling about?”

Yeji almost drops her phone in surprise at the sound of her companion’s voice. It’s way too late for anybody else to be out on campus grounds, with most of the street lights turned off for the night. However, the volunteers of the JYU Meta Alliance Nightwatch program (“metahumans protecting JYU, one Tuesday night at the time” is the overly specific working tagline) are not just anybody. They must be skilled. Dedicated. Still bored after a fun Tuesday night of playing charades with the shapeshifters. Yeji just happened to satisfy all three categories easily.

Hwang Hyunjin, the guy who failed to help her find her snake of an ex-roommate, is her partner for the night. The telepath is one of the few metahumans Yeji has befriended after folding origamis with the MA members for almost half a year. He’s looking at her expectantly now, eyes trying to peek at the phone Yeji just saved from being thrown into smithereens.

“Nothing.” The phone screen turns off as Yeji innocently presses the power button. “Just some meme my roommate sent me.”

It’s actually a picture of Jisu dozing off with a half-eaten chocolate in her hand, sent by Yuna from having stayed over a week ago. Pitiful, but adorable. The image is forever ingrained in her head, and suddenly Yeji finds herself thanking the heavens for Jisu.

“Are you really that whipped?”

“Shut up,” Yeji shoves Hyunjin lightly. “Aren’t you supposed to stop reading others for the meantime?”

“What President Kim doesn’t know won’t hurt her, Yeji.” Hyunjin scoffs.

An eagle suddenly dips towards them mid-flight, its angry screech surprising the both of them. A few flyers from Hyunjin’s hands drift with the wind from the powerful bird’s wings. Those flyers won’t be going into the hands of new MA recruits anytime soon.

“Okay, okay! I’ll stop! Are you happy?” The boy groans, glaring at the bird who’s now perched up on some tree. His partner only watches in amusement as he jumps and dives to catch some of them desperately. “Gosh, I swear Kim Dahyun is going to appear at my window just for breathing or something.”

“You did convince your roommate that the floor is actually lava.” Yeji snorts, playing with the flashlight in her other hand. “But we should be moving now. I bet the others are finished with their areas.”

She pockets her phone as she starts walking again. Yeji scans the almost pitch-black path to the university dorms, seeing the lights of a few torchlights from far away. Her steps towards the last stretch of their area are relaxed. This night is close to its end.

“I think President Kim wants me out of the membership committee with the way she’s looking at me right now.” Hyunjin’s voice is accompanied by his footsteps, catching up to Yeji.

“That’s not true,” she turns to him, frowning. “You’re the only person I know who can tell a metahuman and a human apart. Pretty essential if you ask me.”

Hyunjin clicks his tongue in disagreement. “That can be learned, my friend. Or maybe you just need to get out more. You know, meet people, have fun. You’re either rehearsing for some performance or sleeping in every time I call you to come out.”

“But sleeping _is_ fun, Hyunjin.”

The aforementioned boy gapes at Yeji, appalled at her idea of fun. He then hides the bottom of his face with the salvaged flyers, eyes gleaming mischievously. “With or without your roommate?”

Yeji immediately rolls her eyes. It’s an acquired reflex every time Jisu is brought up in such light, with the number of times Hyunjin has done so. What’s up with that, really?

“We’ve talked about this,” she breathes out, looking away. “Jisu’s not like that.”

Indeed, Jisu’s totally did not like that. Not with her long, colorful, acrylic nails, and cute dresses she wears every time she goes out with her “friends'' on Friday nights. Not with her ability to gush about actors on TV shows she watches for hours on end, seemingly lovestruck. Not with the palpable tension she seems to have with the guys Yeji has seen her with whenever they bump into each other on campus. Not with the way she looks at them.

And besides, Jisu is one of Yeji’s closest friends now. They’ve cried through The Notebook together, cursed stupid movie protagonists together, told stories about their worst dates, horrible internships, family affairs, and recounted secrets they never thought they’d tell anybody. Yeji likes her—but not in that way. Sure, she still hasn’t got used to the girl being a walking skinship bomb, but dating her would be… weird, right? She can’t possibly like Jisu like—

“Are you not even going to try to shoot your shot? I thought you were the type to not give up so easily.” Hyunjin shrugs incredulously.

“She’s just a friend, Hyunjin,” Yeji brushes off. There’s surely a part of her that believes in those very words, but another part of her feels bitter. Upset, almost. She knows she shouldn’t be.

“Hey,” Hyunjin’s voice is suddenly tentative, “I think I dropped my flashlight under the bus over there.”

Yeji stops in her tracks. She turns to him with a hand on her hip.

“You think?”

“I _know_ I dropped my flashlight under the bus.”

Hyunjin corrects, smiling sheepishly as Yeji shakes her head in pity. He then jogs towards the lone bus at the end of the street they’re in, deep blue paint almost blending with the darkness of the night.

Yeji looks on as she follows. Hyunjin is on his knees now to reach the poor thing. He can get under the bus itself if he tried, but his tight jeans won’t exactly allow that much movement. The girl turns her flashlight on and flashes it at him.

“You okay there?”

“Y-yup,” Hyunjin says as he struggles, “I just—argh—can’t reach the damn thing. It’s just right there.”

Yeji looks around the area for bystanders. There’s nobody else here as far as they’re both concerned, and Dahyun made sure that the guards watching the CCTVs would delete the footage tonight if nothing was suspicious. The guards knew who they were. They knew what they were capable of. The feat that Yeji thinks she should perform isn’t something she has done before, but with the number of doorknobs she has broken and grocery bags she has carried, she figures it wouldn’t be too hard. She should probably be a good friend and lend a hand.

“Stop. Let me help you,” Yeji says once she’s standing by the headlights of the bus, immediately making Hyunjin stand up. “I’ll lift it up so you can get in. Hold this for me.”

She extends the flashlight to Hyunjin without looking at him. She’s only focused on the old bus that’s standing between her and Hyunjin’s flashlight. The bumper seems sturdy enough to grip onto, but she needed to hold onto the chassis too so that she won’t rip anything off the vehicle. If only she had her other hand free of the flashlight…

“Yeji.”

“Just hold the flashlight, Hyunjin.”

“There’s… blood.”

“Blood?” Yeji asks, peeling her eyes away from the vehicle. She feels something crawl under her skin when she sees Hyunjin looking at his hands, soiled with dust from the asphalt below and a dark, viscous liquid. His acid-washed jeans have specks of red in them. It almost looks like paint. Yeji hopes that it’s just paint.

“Do you know how to get blood off jeans?” Hyunjin retches as he smells his hands, foul and metallic. He grimaces. “You should know that, right?”

“Where is it coming from?” Yeji ignores his useless queries, pointing her flashlight below the bus. The front of the vehicle is clear of anything, but there’s something suspicious towards the middle. A long, bulky-looking thing covered by a black cloth. Peeking from underneath the cloth is a suede blue fabric with one side of an opened zipper. From a jacket, it seems. It’s bloodied and dirty, but Yeji thinks that she has seen something like it before. Wrapped around a particular seat at the so-called “water benders” table at their Meta Alliance meetings, maybe. And then, a muffled groan.

Yeji feels her mouth go dry.

“Did you hear that?” She hears Hyunjin ask, and it takes everything in her to not say “no” and run away from this entirely. She braces herself for the worst.

“Hold this while I lift, Hyunjin.”

When Yeji feels the weight of the flashlight being taken from her hand, she moves. As fast as she can, she swoops in to grab the bus chassis. She feels her muscles tense and her heart pump forcefully as she lifts, 8 tons of metal like a kilogram in her hands. The bus is now off the ground enough for Hyunjin to squeeze himself under it, the light from Yeji’s flashlight disappearing into the darkness. His own flashlight is thrown haphazardly towards Yeji’s direction. The girl feels her sweat roll off her forehead as she tries to maintain her grip, clammy hands making it even more difficult.

It’s when Hyunjin finally pulls out the body from under the bus—yes, a body, of an actual person—that Yeji releases, the bus contacting the ground with a resounding boom.

Hyunjin is holding the body’s head when Yeji comes around to see them. The unconscious, familiar boy in Hyunjin’s lap has a large, open wound on his head. Yeji covers her mouth in shock.

“Yongseung’s still here,” Hyunjin says ominously, not caring about the state of his jeans anymore. “We have to call an ambulance.”

Yeji nods, trembling hands fumbling with her phone as she makes the call. A pang hits her chest, one of concern, of fear, of guilt as if Hyunjin and her could’ve prevented this from happening. The eagle from earlier quickly swoops in again at them, shapeshifting to reveal Dahyun, the MA president.

“Shit. How long has he been under there?” Dahyun starts inspecting the barely conscious boy with her eyes alone. “Yeji, are you calling the ambulance?”

“Y-yeah, unnie,” Yeji barely makes out, phone pressed to her ear. “They’re—Hello? Um, we need an ambulance. We found a friend of ours unconscious under a bus and he’s bleeding a lot… From his head, yes. W-we’re near the JYU dorms right now. In front of Jo Kwon Hall….”

Yeji’s hands don’t stop trembling until after she helps load Yongseung’s body onto a stretcher, cold and limp.


	3. cruise

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ...yejisu, anyone?

_Beep._

_HR: 60 bpm_

“Yeji-ah.”

“. . .”

“Hwang Yeji?”

A tug on the sleeve of her sweatshirt.

“. . . .”

“You’ve got fried rice on your hair.”

“Oh. Sorry.” Yeji is uncharacteristically slow when she straightens up, voice hoarse from her short, unintended nap. The spoon that she’s holding clatters as she puts it back down on the table, hastily trying to rub out every grain of sleepiness from her eyes.

Across the kitchen island, Jisu is watching her with a concerned frown.

“Are you okay? You can get some more sleep if you want to.”

“And miss breakfast with you?” Yeji’s eyes flutter open, combing back her long hair with her hand absentmindedly. The bits of food in her hair are brushed off with every stroke. “Last Wednesday you were being all sulky with me just because I slept in without telling you.”

“I had a pretty good spread laid out.” Jisu shrugs. “Is it bad that I wanted to share it with you?”

Yeji shakes her head. Her roommate is quick to resume having her meal, shoveling a small heap of fried rice with her own spoon. Yeji’s own is barely touched, scrambled eggs that she always eats first scattered in her bowl, waiting to be eaten. Her stomach nags with pain at the sight. However, her thoughts remain preoccupied. In them, there’s something that she has tried to lift and throw away since last night. Something way heavier than a bus.

Yeji’s vision starts to alternatively flicker from the sight of her food to pitch black.

“Okay, I have an idea,” Jisu stands up so abruptly that it almost makes Yeji flinch, accompanied by the grating sound of her chair’s feet scraping hardwood floor.

Before Yeji can react, Jisu holds her by the arm and pulls her up, grip surprisingly strong. Yeji looks back at the food still on the kitchen island—all prepared by Jisu herself, like most Wednesdays. Sulky Jisu is a little cute, if Yeji were to be honest, but she didn’t seem like it today. Did Yeji not notice?

“Hey, what are you…” The girl trails off, letting herself be dragged along. They reach the threshold of Yeji’s quaint bedroom, Jisu opening the door gently. Yeji’s brows furrowed in confusion.

Jisu turns to her, patting the small of her back. “Go lie down. I’ll be right back.”

When Jisu leaves, Yeji is left standing there, looking at her mess of a bedroom. Clothes were strewn everywhere she looked. She barely cleaned up the mess of last night, or this morning, rather. Somewhere in the streets of Seoul at one in the morning, Yeji was still up and about, walking alongside Dahyun and Hyunjin.

Yeji glues her eyes shut for a moment. There’s nothing she wants more than to forget everything that happened last night.

She walks slowly towards her bed, placed in the center of the room. She makes sure to kick her bloodstained tee under the bed frame before finally laying down, slipping into her sheets. The sound of wheels rolling against the apartment floor makes Yeji crane her head towards the open door. Soon enough, Jisu emerges—pushing an overbed table narrow enough to pass through the doorway, carrying food.

“Wow,” Yeji sits up. “Should I be expecting a hospital orderly to knock at our door due to a missing table?”

“Very funny, but no,” Jisu chuckles, carefully navigating through the clothes-littered floor of Yeji’s room. “Saw this at a garage sale last week. Figured I would get it just in case.”

“Just in case your roommate might be too tired to eat breakfast with you?”

Jisu rolls her eyes good-naturedly. “Please don’t flatter yourself too much, Hwang.”

Yeji lets out a small chuckle as she keeps her eyes on Jisu. It takes the latter a few moments to properly position the table, adjusting the height accordingly. She then makes her way towards the bed after that, Yeji scooting over to make room for her. Once she rests the weight of her whole body onto the bed, Jisu sighs in contentment.

“Your mattress is way nicer than mine,” she comments, nudging Yeji with her shoulder.

The latter hums, reaching over to grab her bowl of unfinished food on the overbed table. “Probably because of how many guys my ex-roommate brought over.”

“I did not need to know that!” Jisu whines, looking at Yeji with wide eyes. “Now I’ll feel weird sleeping in that bed.”

“You can sleep on the couch since you used to sleep on it when you first came,” Yeji says before putting a spoonful of rice into her mouth.

“The only reason I hung around that thing until midnight is because I wanted to catch you outside and talk to you.” Jisu suddenly admits, hand reaching for her signature baby blue mug. “It didn’t make sense to not talk to someone who’s not a total stranger, you know?”

Yeji hums in agreement, continuing to eat silently. Talking to Jisu seemed like an alternate reality then, but now she was here, having an honest conversation. Eating breakfast with her. In bed. Fourteen-year old Hwang Yeji would pass out and fly off to the moon if she knew.

“So…” Jisu speaks up after a long yet comfortable silence, “did Tuesday game night burn you out that bad?”

Yeji stops eating entirely. The sight of Kim Yongseung’s bloody head under the bright hospital lights flashes in her mind, making her lose her appetite.

“No, it’s not that,” she mumbles, gently putting back her now half-eaten bowl of rice on the table in front of her.

“Then what is it?”

Yeji turns to Jisu and finds the latter staring at her, eyebrows furrowed slightly. Their proximity takes Yeji aback, as she can now see every minute detail of Jisu’s pretty face. Choi Jisu’s eyes, in particular, are incredibly dangerous. It makes Yeji want to reveal the entirety of herself. Every single truth she held. Every vulnerability.

It makes Yeji want to tell Jisu things that she shouldn’t know. The flying, the doorknobs, the true nature of her game night group. The bus. The junior currently in a coma. The reason why she barely got any sleep after one of the most tiring nights of her life.

(And maybe, her confusing feelings about Jisu. Luckily, she’s still too confused about it to say anything stupid.)

Yeji sighs. “Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Do you ever get the feeling that you’re being watched?”

Jisu shakes her head softly. “No. Do you?”

“Last night,” Yeji starts, looking down at the blanket draped over them both, “on my way home from game night with my friends…”

_“This is all my fault,” is the first thing Dahyun says to Yeji and Hyunjin once they walk out of the premises of the hospital where Yongseung is, comatose from the severity of his injuries. The other Meta Alliance members on duty for night watch have went home earlier than the three, and some of Yongseung’s friends decided to stay a while to wait for his parents._

_Yeji looks down at her pulse watch and reads the time. 1:30AM. Police questioning must have taken place inside the ER an hour ago. She lags behind her fellow metahumans, thoughtfully looking down at the specks of blood on her shirt._

_“Did you know that this was going to happen?” Hyunjin asks, massaging his temples._

_“I’m a bird, Hyunjin, not an oracle,” Dahyun rebuts._

_“But how is this all your fault?”_

_Dahyun lets out an exasperated sigh, ruffling her brunette hair. “Something like this has been happening in many universities in the country. I had known about this for weeks. I was foolishly convinced of our safety to not tell anybody. I didn’t think it would reach JYU this quickly but now… it just did.”_

_“W-what?” Hyunjin sputters. “Why wasn’t that on the news?”_

_Dahyun stops. She turns around to look at both Hyunjin and Yeji, who stop with her and watch her with curious eyes._

_“You two might think I’m a tin foil hat wearing conspiracy theorist,” she prefaces, “but hear me out. Do you two remember the publicized trial of the pyrokinetic who burned down a high-rise building in Ansan?”_

_“I do.” Yeji answers, glancing at a confused Hyunjin. “That was all over the news a few months ago. What does that have to do with this?”_

_“The company who owns that building is led by a metahuman-hating jerk.” Dahyun scoffs. “The SMCU metahuman org already had a few of its members missing after interning there. No news coverage either. The jerk is powerful enough to cover anything up.”_

_Dahyun looks cautiously around the area. They’ve made enough distance from the hospital, now in front of closed shops and bookstores approaching the university grounds. However, she still leans into both Yeji and Hyunjin, as if anybody would hear them in the empty street._

_“He’s spearheading a movement against our kind,” she whispers. “Spreading fear among insecure folks. Making them do the unimaginable. Sinister hate crimes.”_

_The thought of something so diabolical makes Yeji’s blood run cold._

_“How do they know who to take?” Hyunjin immediately asks. “We look just like regular humans. No telepathic metahuman will want to side with them, right?”_

_“The org,” Yeji realizes. “There’s a list of members of MA in JYU student records. They could probably start from there.”_

_Dahyun silently nods in affirmation. “Metahumans are humans too. Remember that. Vulnerable to greed, to power, to circumstance. Right now, between me and you guys, I’d doubt who I’ll trust.”_

_“Does this mean we can’t trust you eith—ouch!” Hyunjin is stepped on by Dahyun even before he can finish his question. His grunt of retaliation falls on deaf ears as the president turns around, paying him no mind._

_Yeji remains frozen as she watches her walk away. “What do we do now?”_

_“We stay safe. We stop meeting for a while, just until everything dies down.” Dahyun’s voice is calm, just like her footsteps. “We go about our lives, blending into society, just like before joining MA. We keep an eye out.”_

_The girl pauses. She turns to look at Yeji and Hyunjin, a small smile on her face._

_“I’d hate to lose you two. Especially after tonight.”_

_In a flash, Dahyun shifts to her eagle form, silently flapping her wings to fly towards home. The bird leaves two confused people in its wake, left to digest the information given to them by themselves. Hyunjin’s silence is enough for Yeji to know that he’s taking this seriously._

_“See you when I see you, I guess,” he says after a moment, patting Yeji’s shoulder. He walks away from her towards the direction of the university, almost dragging his feet._

_Yeji sighs. Her apartment complex is twenty minutes away on foot. The only thing she hears now is how loud her pulse watch is._

HR: 105 bpm.

_Although she isn’t in imminent danger now, the thought that she could end up just like Yongseung is getting the best of her. Yeji needed to sleep this off. Now._

_With one hand removing her annoying watch, she crosses the road, headed for the nearest shortcut. The alley she enters is dark and musty, walls narrowing ever so slightly as she advances. The walls almost stick to her skin, like a flytrap capturing its prey. Yeji heaves. She needs to calm down. She doesn’t need to overthink things right now._

_“Nothing else is going to happen tonight, alright?” She tells herself as she emerges from the alleyway, nearer to her destination. Yeji looks left and right, observing the empty street she’s on._

_The warm streetlights show her nothing._

_To further ease the feeling in her chest, Yeji starts running towards the direction of her apartment complex. She tries her hardest to ignore the idea or sensation—Yeji isn’t really sure—of having someone on her tail, following her every move. On top of that, her brain is seemingly conjuring everything she’s been afraid of all at once._

_Yeji decides to focus on the noise that her shoes make. Its squeaks, the sound of rubber hitting pavement. The rhythm they both make is regular, a contrast to her winding mind. When she finally sees the familiar gate of the complex right within her line of sight, Yeji slows down to a jog._

_“Oh god,” she huffs out, talking to herself once more. “Why am I running away from something that isn’t even there?”_

_The sound of glass breaking makes Yeji stop. She turns around towards the direction of the noise._

_Not too far away behind her, under the orange glow of a streetlight, is a person wearing a bunny mask, something shiny in their hand. It was a sensation, then. Of someone on her tail. They seem to be looking right at her. As if they were hunting her._

_Yeji doesn’t want to stay here and find out._

_With an erratic heart and an anxious mind, she runs away faster than ever._

“…I felt like someone was watching and following me home. Staring at me from far away.” Yeji sighs, leaving out chunks of the truth. “Before entering the street outside the apartment complex, I looked back to see a person standing a few feet away. It looked like they’d been following me ever since I left my friends near the campus. They looked so scary. I was up all night trying to forget them. Trying to make myself believe that they weren’t real.”

The silence that follows is deafening. Yeji wants to disappear for unloading her fears onto Jisu like that. “Sorry,” she clears her throat, “that was stupid, I’m—”

“I don’t think it is.” Jisu grabs onto Yeji’s sweatshirt sleeve, tugging softly. “Someone you don’t know following you home is scarier than any horror movie will ever be.” The cool of her finger pokes at Yeji’s cheek, making the latter look at her.

“It’s okay to feel scared,” she continues, her smile incredibly reassuring. It makes Yeji flash a smile back, one that’s silently trying to portray gratitude in the best way it could. “Did anything else happen?”

Yeji shakes her head. The last thing she wants is for Jisu to feel the burden that she has. The burden of knowing that somewhere, someone is out to make people like Yeji and Chaeryeong suffer. It won’t do anything good to someone as caring and kind as Jisu. She didn’t deserve to know that.

Jisu suddenly gasps, grinning at Yeji teasingly. “Are you sure it wasn’t a ghost?”

Yeji snorts. “Are ghosts even real?”

“Well,” the younger girl starts, taking a sip from her mug, “those people who set fire to things with their mind and stretch their arms like crazy are real. I wouldn’t be _that_ surprised.”

The comment doesn’t make Yeji respond like she usually would. She’s too focused on Jisu’s face and the way that she licks her lips in habit, every single expression she makes now committed to memory. Yeji knows that she’s staring now, unabashed, but suddenly Jisu is too, enchanting eyes looking back at her like she’s all she sees. When did Jisu start looking at her like that? Does Yeji have something on her face?

Neither party seems to want to back down from their impromptu staring contest. However, Yeji’s eyelids betray her as they start closing on their own.

“You should really get some sleep, Yeji.” Jisu chides softly.

“I’ve been taking naps throughout breakfast today, so I guess that counts as some sleep?” Yeji opens her eyes as she reasons. Jisu puts back her mug on the overbed table for a moment before glaring at her, delicate arms crossed over her chest.

“No,” she says, shaking her head.

“I think I’ve gotten ten minutes of sleep back there, which is better than nothing?” Yeji tries.

“Nope.”

“But I can’t fall asleep, _mom_ ,” Yeji whines jokingly, making the other girl crack a smile. The giggling that ensues makes Yeji’s heart feel a thousand times bigger, with Jisu burying her face in her hair, shoulders shaking as she laughs.

Jisu sighs fondly once they’ve sobered up, sitting up straight to look at a grinning Yeji. “You’re helpless. You’ve given me no choice.”

“What do you mean?”

“Do you want to know what I do when I get scared?” Jisu smiles knowingly.

Yeji tilts her head. “I believe you’ll still tell me if I tell you I don’t, so…”

“Right.” Jisu lets out a chuckle. She lies down, dark locks splaying out on Yeji’s white pillow like paint splattered on canvas. She reaches out for Yeji’s sleeve to tug at it again, a silent invitation for the girl to lie down with her.

Although hesitant, Yeji follows, slipping deeper into her sheets, welcoming the sensation of another body being with her underneath. Her eyes automatically turn to the plain white ceiling above the bed, clean from her anxiety-induced scrubbing spree at four in the morning courtesy of her ability to float. It felt frustrating. To be so afraid of something that she can’t help but stay awake.

When she sighs, she hears rustling from the girl next to her, and then feels a hand slipping into her own.

Yeji almost jumps in surprise, but her heart is already doing that for her. Her pulse watch’s beeps are suddenly being way too loud in their sleepy apartment.

_HR: 95 bpm_

“You okay there?” Jisu’s chuckle is low, attractively low that it makes Yeji’s heart soar. Her hand that’s in Yeji’s feels inadequately warmed, cold like the iced coffee Jisu always drinks, but it just makes Yeji want to hold it tighter. Warm it up more with her own.

Jisu suddenly shuffles even closer to her, their shoulders touching. “Is my hand too cold, or…?”

Her breath is hot against Yeji’s ear, a stark contrast with her cold hands. Yeji shakes her head. She’s hyperaware of Jisu’s breath still on the side of her face and the smell of her vanilla-scented shampoo, clouding her senses as she tries to calm the beast in her ribcage. It’s the thumb that starts rubbing the back of her hand that makes her feel at ease, however, soft and gentle. And just like that, the beast is tamed, the beeping slowing down until it’s almost inaudible.

_HR: 70 bpm_

“Huh.” Yeji lets out absentmindedly.

“I know it’s not much, but I always feel a little better when I hold somebody else’s hand. Makes me feel like I’m not alone.” Jisu whispers, grin evident in her tone. “And now I hope you do too.”

“Have your hands always been this cold?” Yeji’s voice is quiet, seemingly afraid that her voice might break this delicate moment between the two of them.

“Yes,” Jisu squeezes her hand. “You’ve held my hand once. If you remember.”

The memory is fuzzy in Yeji’s sleep-deprived mind, of pulling a young Choi Jisu away from a certain doom, of a hand that is cold as ice. “Oh,” she mumbles.

“I think you’re the first person who actually grabbed my hand like that without pulling away.” Jisu confesses, thumb stopping its ministrations on Yeji’s hand in thought.

“Is that a good thing?”

“Yeah,” the girl nods, shifting to rest her head on the side of Yeji’s arm. “Did heaps for my self-esteem.”

Yeji smiles, her body relaxing into the warmth of another body’s, of another person’s heart. The familiar humming that blooms from Jisu’s throat seemed to quell every single dark thought Yeji holds, along with the cool of her dainty hands.

“Are you staying here until I fall asleep?” Yeji whispers.

“Mm-hmm.”

Another squeeze.

“You don’t have anything better to do?” Yeji squeezes her hand right back.

Jisu laughs softly before sighing, her thumb moving against Yeji’s skin again. “Close your eyes, Yeji-ah.”

In her dreams, Yeji sees a peaceful sky on a snowy morning, and on her cheek, a fleeting sensation of something soft and warm.

_Beep. Beep._

_HR: 70 bpm_

JYU Meta Alliance stops meeting the following week.

Their room in the student center is emptied out, ridded of any trace of life, as if they never really existed. Whenever Yeji passes by on days when she picks up Ryujin from her photography org, she can’t help but think back to what Dahyun said, to what it all meant for them. They still have a group chat where they occasionally send memes, announcements about the at-home training programs the board prepared for the week, and selfies as part of a weekly roll call. Just to know if they’re safe and alive.

Two months into the suspension of their weekly Tuesday meetings, twenty people stopped sending selfies. Stopped replying to texts. Stopped opening the chat room entirely. Yeji tries not to think about them too much. She decides to busy herself with her friends, her colleagues at the dance department, her rehearsals, her studying. Her Tuesday game nights get replaced by sleeping in, folding her laundry, or watching a movie or whatever’s on TV with Jisu whenever they can’t sleep.

Oftentimes, it’s Jisu that falls asleep first—either on Yeji’s lap, on her shoulder, or just while sitting very still. The night ends with Yeji carefully carrying Jisu to her room, not wanting to stir the girl awake.

However, on one occasion, Yeji was not being careful enough.

“Stay,” Jisu says, voice hoarser than normal. “Stay and cuddle with me.”

Her eyelids open to reveal bleary eyes, pupils wide as she takes in the sight of Yeji on top of her in the dimly lit room, mere moments after being dropped onto the bed.

Meanwhile, Yeji is frozen in place. “C-cuddle?”

Jisu nods, as if it’s the most normal thing in the world. She must’ve seen the look of horror that flashed briefly over Yeji’s features when she frowns. “Only if you want to,” she says quietly.

“What’s in it for me?” Yeji asks, moving away to sit on the edge of the bed.

Jisu’s nose crinkles in a way that makes Yeji’s heart leap when she smiles. “You’ll get to wake up next to me?”

Yeji’s stomach feels funny at the mere thought of that. Of Jisu’s face the first thing she sees when she wakes up, of the image of sunlight filtering through Jisu’s blinds, hitting her features just right. A sight to behold. It’s been a while since she started having these thoughts, and yet, Yeji still doesn’t know _why_. All she knows is that Jisu has been succeeding in making her more flustered than usual.

A soft laugh escapes Yeji’s lips. “I think you should stop taking flirting advice from Ryujin.”

“I know. I’m starting to sound like her,” Jisu groans, hiding her face in her hands. She peeks through her fingers to look at Yeji expectantly. “But you’ll still say yes, right?”

Yeji glances at the opened door of Jisu’s room. Across from it is her own room, recently cleaned with newly replaced bed sheets that smell like fabric softener. She’ll be better off sleeping there, definitely. Without any thoughts of Jisu. With her heart not wanting to jump out of her throat.

(Yeji thanks her past self for removing her pulse watch before taking Jisu to her room.)

“My bed is way comfier than yours, so…” she reasons, looking back at the girl lying in her own bed.

“Carry me to your bed, then.” Jisu says smugly.

Yeji snorts. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

“Just—forget the cuddling. Sleep next to me. Please?” Jisu sits up, hand reaching out to touch Yeji’s. “I’m having a hard time falling asleep right now.”

“You fell asleep two-thirds into the movie we were watching.” Yeji chuckles, intertwining their fingers naturally, like the many times they’ve done before.

“But that’s because I was watching it with you.”

Yeji narrows her eyes at Jisu in disbelief.

“I’m serious,” the latter says, raising her other hand. “You make me feel at ease.”

“Something bothering you that much?”

“I have this big presentation in about…” Jisu bites her lip, looking down at their intertwined hands to look at Yeji’s wrist. When she doesn’t find a watch, she looks up, squinting at the display of her digital wall clock. “Seven hours,” she breathes out, shoulders slumping. She turns to Yeji with a pout.

And just like that, Yeji’s thin wall of resolve crumbles, making her lull her head back in defeat. She hears Jisu giggle softly, releasing her hand to lie back down again. Yeji lies down chest first, face hitting one of Jisu’s pillows with a soft thud.

“I think I’m spoiling you way too much,” she mumbles.

“You spoil all of your friends, Yeji-ah.”

Yeji lifts her head to raise an eyebrow at Jisu. “Really?”

“Yeah,” Jisu laughs, nodding fervently. “You watched Ryujin’s short film and critiqued it until four in the morning despite having classes at eight. You let Yuna sleep here so often that she has a toothbrush in the bathroom. You play that stupid mobile game Chaeryeong’s addicted to every morning just so she can have someone else to play with.”

“Shit.” Yeji’s eyes widen. “I’m going to miss playing omok with Chaeryeong later. Should I text her and tell her?”

Jisu smirks.

Yeji plants her face back down on the pillow, groaning. “I hate that you’re right.”

“How am I any different?” Jisu mumbles thoughtfully. All of her boldness from earlier seem to have disappeared completely, now buried in her cottony bedsheets. It is as if she didn’t mean to ask the question in the first place. A slip of the tongue, a mistake. As if it wasn’t supposed to be heard by Yeji’s ears. Only a question for herself. How _is_ Jisu different from the rest of her friends? To be honest, Yeji doesn’t know.

(Or maybe she just doesn’t want to admit that she knows.)

Yeji finds herself mulling it over as she lies in Jisu’s bed, awakened hours after, now left to stare at Jisu as she continues to sleep. Yeji’s mind wanders to every memory she has of Jisu—every song she ever hummed, every little habit, every embarrassing blunder, every together breakfast, every conversation, every laugh, every smile. Every time she made Yeji feel at ease. Every time she’d make Yeji’s heart want to blast off to space, sending Yeji’s feet floating off the ground. Every time she held Yeji’s hand. Every time Yeji had to reach out and hold hers. Every time Yeji thought of holding Jisu in her arms.

When the sunlight finally bleeds through the gaps of the blinds and makes Jisu look ethereal, Yeji’s heart swells. At that moment, everything just _clicks_.

It’s when she’s telling Ryujin about the whole incident days after that she finally says it out loud—

“I think I’m in love with my roommate.”

“Wow.” Ryujin blinks, unaffected. “Never heard of that one before.”

Yeji glares at her best friend. “Ryujin, this is serious!”

“But this is exactly what you said before Mako moved out and you got your roommate from hell.” The younger girl explains, hands gesticulating all over the place. “Mako was cool,” Ryujin shrugs. “Now she won’t even look at your direction.”

Yeji shudders at the memory of her soju-fueled confession when she was a sophomore. Needless to say, it didn’t go well. She frowns. “Did you have to rub it in like that?” she asks softly.

“Sorry, unnie.” Ryujin says, digging her back further into the wall where they’re currently hiding. They’re a good distance away from the outside tables and chairs of a busy Italian restaurant. “At least you’re not in love with someone who has obviously gotten over you.”

“Spying on Chaeryeong’s dates stopped sparking joy in you, huh?”

Ryujin sighs. “As much as I hate to admit it. Especially when she’s obviously having fun.”

The two girls can only look on as Chaeryeong sits opposite her date under a large, black umbrella, plates of half-eaten pasta on the table in front of them. They watch as their friend throws her head back, laughing at something her date just said. The aforementioned date then leans over to wipe what appears to be pasta sauce on the side of Chaeryeong’s mouth with his table napkin. “Yuck,” Ryujin says in disdain.

“You’re acting like you didn’t introduce Yeongin to her.” Yeji rolls her eyes.

“Am I not allowed to regret my decision?” Ryujin turns to the older girl exasperatedly, who can only shake her head in response.

(There are plenty of decisions Yeji has ended up regretting through the years, but none of them is probably as regrettable as freshman Shin Ryujin breaking up with her best friend turned girlfriend of a year over some girl in her composition class. Well, mostly because of that. Yeji has yet to experience such a screw-up. She hopes she doesn’t jinx it.)

“I know you’re good at making decisions especially when it counts,” the younger girl suddenly says, as if reading Yeji’s mind, “but I hope you won’t let go of someone you really care about like I did.” She still says it like herself, coolly, as if without a care in the world. The tinge of sadness hiding in her eyes makes all the difference, though. Yeji puts an arm over her shoulder to hold her close.

“So…” the older girl rocks them back and forth. It’s enough to make Ryujin chuckle. Yeji beams. “Do you think I should tell her?”

Ryujin smiles up at her. It doesn’t quite reach her eyes, but it’s still there. “It’s best to have the truth laid out,” she nods. “Whatever Jisu unnie does with the information is up to her.”

“When do you think I should do it?” Yeji briefly looks up to the open night sky, slightly hoping to find a confession schedule in some flying banner attached to an airplane. “Finals just ended and Jisu might be visiting Canada for the break. Should I wait until she’s back?”

“Want to ask Chaeryeong about it?” Ryujin suggests, pointing to the girl who is still enjoying her date over faux candlelight and jazz renditions of popular songs. Yeji immediately shakes her head in horror. Some secrets are safe with Chaeryeong, but she may get too excited over this one.

“How about you tell her right now?”

Yeji’s eyebrows immediately furrow in confusion. “What do you mean right now?”

“Hey, you two!”

Jisu’s voice sends shivers down Yeji’s spine, her mind unconsciously wandering to the image of Jisu’s face and sunlight beautifully becoming one. Yeji has to think of not flying off to space any moment now. Jisu stands in front of her and Ryujin, flashing them an apologetic grin. “I had to pass something before coming here. How’s the spying going?”

“Shh, Agent Choi. The target might hear you.” Ryujin shushes, peeling Yeji’s arm from her shoulder with a mischievous smirk, back to her old, annoying self. She turns her back to Jisu to give Yeji a subtle wink of encouragement before she turns to Jisu cheekily, whispering. “I’ll just go in for a closer look.”

And with that, she sneaks off to blend into the nearest bush with her olive-green hoodie, garnering judgmental stares from the kids at the ice cream parlor right beside it. Yeji snorts.

“Have you guys been here long?” Jisu asks.

“Just about 20 minutes,” Yeji replies, looking back at her roommate with a nervous smile—why is she even nervous right now?.

There’s a playful glint in Jisu’s eyes as she shuffles to take her place in front of the wall beside Yeji, two finger pistols up in the air. An equally playful grin graces her features as she regards Yeji. “Got any interesting intel yet, Agent Hwang?”

“Well,” Yeji giggles as she glances over, seeing the couple taking selfies, “they’ve been doing usual date stuff. Nothing too interesting, I presume.”

“That’s too bad.” Jisu makes a show of putting back her finger pistols in her pockets as she clicks her tongue in disappointment. “I hope your day has been good despite this uneventful stakeout. Mine has been pretty bad.”

“Why? Got a bad grade on your presentation?” Yeji asks.

“Far from it.” Jisu grins smugly. “I had you by my side to chase the bad grade fairy away. Thank you for that.” Their palms meet briefly for the softest of high fives, Jisu chuckling soon after.

Then and there, Yeji briefly remembers the aftermath of having her breath taken away by the sight of her sleeping roommate. After falling back asleep filled with thoughts of Jisu & being late to her first and only class of the day, she finds a note on their small kitchen island (“ _Thank you for last night. Sorry if I made you uncomfortable with my… needy demands lol. I left breakfast in the microwave. I tried putting more vegetables like you asked. Can’t promise that I ate all in mine though. See you later!”)._ However, what made Yeji float that day is the tiny, legible footnote at the bottom of the paper:

 _“I hope you never get tired of me, Yeji,”_ it said. _“I like being with you.”_

(“ _Are you sure she doesn’t like you in_ that _way?_ ” Hyunjin had asked her on the phone after she accidentally sent him a picture of the note. Stupid trembling fingers. Her phone broke in the middle of that conversation after Yeji had unceremoniously crushed it in her hand, too flustered to expound on the nature of her roommate’s “needy demands”.)

“Say, Yeji.”

Yeji shook her head awake from her daydream. “Hmm?”

Jisu is now looking over at Ryujin who has advanced into enemy territory, sitting on a bench directly opposite the restaurant. Chaeryeong would definitely see her if she only looked to her right. As Yeji starts thinking of a valid excuse to cancel movie night to avoid a heartbroken Yuna (who’s already waiting with pizza and soda at “Yejisu’s apartment”—her words, not Yeji’s) and a pissed off Chaeryeong, who specifically told them to wait for her at the said apartment, Jisu squeezes her elbow.

“Did Ryujin and you ever…”

“Ever what?” Yeji blinks.

“… _see_ each other? Like,” Jisu turns to her with curious eyes, her hand still on Yeji’s arm, “how Ryujin and Chaeryeong did in high school?”

“No.” Yeji answers. “Why?”

“Just curious. I mean, if they did it,” Jisu shrugs, “why couldn’t you?”

Yeji has never thought about that in the many years she has known Ryujin.

“We’ve been joined at the hip since we were toddlers. She’s one of my closest friends.” Yeji smiles at the thought. “It would be weird to date her, you know. Ryujin is almost like family to me.” Jisu only hums at that.

“Besides,” Yeji adds, looping her arm around Jisu’s, “dating her would feel like I was dating myself. Or my sister. Both would be equally weird, to be honest.”

“It isn’t that bad of an idea…” Jisu trails off.

Yeji appears visibly confused. “Incest isn’t a bad idea?”

“N-no! That—that isn’t what I meant.” Jisu blushes.

“Then what do you mean?”

“I meant…”

Yeji blinks. Jisu’s gaze is unwavering.

“Dating you.”

“Oh.” It’s Yeji’s turn to blush. “Pssh. Y-you… don’t really mean that, do you?”

Yeji doesn’t like how fragile she sounded. However, Jisu’s eyes are on her, watching as the red on her cheeks get a little brighter. Yeji holds her breath and waits for the catch, for a “nothing, just forget about it” or a less subtle “of course, but like, in a friendly way”. Something to tell Yeji that this isn’t happening right now, in front of a graffiti wall in a narrow street near the university, where Ryujin is still playing spy not too far away.

_Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep._

_HR: 100 bpm_

Okay, minutes have passed (in Yeji’s mind, where time goes slower whenever she’s struggling to keep it together—it’s only been seconds, really). Jisu remains quiet, unnervingly so. Yeji realizes that maybe there is no catch. Suddenly her heart wants to do things again. Do not fly away, she tells herself. Do not fly away now that your arm is still looped around Jisu’s. Maybe Ryujin is right. There is no better time. She’s going to tell her right now.

“Jisu,” Yeji starts, careful. “I…”

“Jisu!”

The moment shatters right in front of Yeji’s eyes. Damn it! She shouldn’t have stalled!

Jisu swiftly untangles herself from Yeji’s arm, almost running to the owner of the loud voice. Yeji looks up to see a tall guy with boyish looks, blue hair a contrast to his white sweater. He waves both of his hands in a large gesture before Jisu gets to where he’s standing and wraps her in his arms—oh. Oh.

Yeji should’ve seen this coming.

“You didn’t tell me you were coming here. I could’ve taken you.” Yeji hears him say faintly. He beams after breaking the hug, patting Jisu’s head fondly as the girl whines, crossing her arms in retaliation.

Yeji could only watch from afar as they talk. The boy takes a page out of a drama protagonist’s book and puts a stray hair strand behind Jisu’s ear. (“Gross,” Yeji blurts out. It’s probably the Ryujin in her speaking.) It takes a while before Jisu puts her hand on his back (of all places!) and leads the boy towards Yeji, a polite smile on his lips.

For the first time since she was fourteen and was head over heels over fourteen-year-old Jisu, Yeji wants to disappear.

“Soobin, this is Yeji, my roommate I was telling you about.” Jisu smiles, gesturing to Yeji who could only bow. “Yeji-yah,” she calls out a little too sweetly, “this is Soobin. He’s a… _friend_ of mine.”

Huh. A friend. Of course. Jisu’s too nice to break Yeji’s heart just like that. She settles for a toothless smile.

“I hope Jisu has only told you good things about me, Soobin-ssi.”

“She has!” He nods. “You don’t have to worry about anything, really. Oh, by the way,” Soobin turns to Jisu and snaps as if he’s just remembered something important, before turning back to Yeji again. “Do you know of the party Jisu and I are hosting for our department tomorrow?”

Yeji shakes her head blankly. She raises her eyebrow at Jisu who only mouths an “I’ll tell you everything later.”

“I’ll take that as a no, then,” Soobin laughs. “You should really come! Jisu and I are going together. Bring a date with you, too.” His grin is almost infectious if not for the fact that he has the audacity to hold Jisu’s other hand. Right in front of Yeji’s imaginary salad. That definitely has to mean something, right?

“Only if you want to, Yeji.” Jisu is quick to say. “A date isn’t required.”

“…I may know someone who is interested to attend with me.” A lie. Yeji doesn’t. “What’s the occasion, if I may ask?”

“It’s a fundraising event for an orphanage in Incheon. We’re doing it in cooperation with Hanabashi Holdings? You must’ve heard about them already. They’ve already pledged 200 million won for a new orphanage building, but the orphanage needs more funds to increase their staff for the children.” Soobin explains. “That’s why we’re inviting everyone to join.”

“Okay, I’ll be there,” Yeji nods in understanding. If it’s really for the kids, then she’s sold. She’ll just have to avoid seeing Jisu with Soobin for most of the night. It can’t be that hard, right? “I’d like to see what you two have planned.”

“It’s really more of Jisu’s work. I’m just a humble accomplice.” Soobin chuckles, a proud look on his face as he glances at Jisu. The latter meets his gaze immediately, an intensity in her eyes that Yeji could not decipher. A look that she hasn’t seen before.

Yeji has to avert her eyes to save her the pain of having this ingrained in her memory.

“Don’t you have somewhere to be, Bin?” she hears Jisu say as she stares at the pavement. A discarded cigarette pack, a small purple flower blooming in one of the cracks, the wrapper of Ryujin’s lollipop she had thrown earlier, and—

“Ah, right! I do, actually.” Soobin’s shy laugh makes Yeji look up immediately. “Um, thank you for your time, Yeji-ssi. I’m hoping to see you tomorrow.”

The boy fires his smile to rival an idol’s one last time before he saunters off, Jisu releasing him from her hold. Yeji watches with a heavy heart as the girl she loves remains there, eyes lingering on Soobin’s figure disappearing into the crowd. She then walks back to Yeji’s side as if nothing had happened, like putting cracks in Yeji’s surprisingly fragile heart was a normal thing.

In that moment, a gust of autumn wind follows Jisu and makes itself known on Yeji’s skin. Cruel and cold like heartbreak. It makes Yeji shiver.

“You cold, Yeddeong?” Jisu blinks up at her, worry plastered on her face.

Yeji shakes her head, feeling the air around them warm up again. “I think it’s just the wind. I’ll be alright.”

Jisu loops her arm around Yeji’s just like how the latter did minutes ago.

“What were you going to tell me again? Before Soobin came?”

Yeji freezes. It pains her to say it, but the timing isn’t right. Maybe the timing won’t be right anytime soon.

“It’s nothing. Just forget about it.” She forces a smile. “You have a party to worry about.”

Jisu purses her lips. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” Yeji affirms. Maybe she’ll end up forgetting it too. “Definitely.”

A heaving Ryujin suddenly appears in front of them, head still concealed by her olive-green hoodie. “Our cover has been blown. I repeat, our cover has been—”

“Shin Ryujin! You’re dead to me!”

Jisu starts laughing hysterically, burying her face in Yeji’s sleeve as Ryujin takes a quick peek of the girl hot on her tail. “Ryuddaeng,” Yeji massages her temples with a groan, “what did you do?”

“No time to explain! We need to run right now! Let’s go!” Ryujin shouts before bolting out of there, earning looks and stares from passers-by. A furious, sprinting Chaeryeong zooms in front of them shortly after, now only an arm’s length away from Ryujin. Jisu and Yeji share an amused look.

“Bet you three packs of gummy worms they’ll make up by the end of the night.” Jisu suggests, grinning brightly. “I’ll text Yuna and ask what she thinks!”

Yeji only laughs in response.

(She’s greeted by three packs of her favorite gummies the next morning.)

**Author's Note:**

> hello! this fic is cross-posted on aff. stay safe, everyone.


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